Internal Promises
by jacedesbff
Summary: What goes on in the heads of Clint Barton and Natasha Romanoff at key points during the film? What promises do they make to themselves and what does it lead them to do after the film? Humor, romance and drama. OMT!
1. Promises

**This is intended to be a three-part story. I wanted to explore a few of the moments in the film a little further – this is the result. I've read a lot about these characters in the past few weeks, so I incorporated a few things from comic lore that I've learned, but I met these characters in the film and that is the basis for this story. **

It wasn't like they'd never slept together – literally or in the Biblical sense. They had. Because, well, each of them needed to prove to themselves that they could, because if they could have sex and still be good friends and partners, then it meant that they weren't in love, right? That's what they told themselves. That and the fact that neither of them was willing to let the insane sexual tension between them rule their partnership. After all, they were the best in their field – nothing as weak as emotions or hormones could rule them.

Until Loki.

Losing a partner to death was one thing – it came with the territory. They avoided talking or thinking about it because the thought of losing each other was too painful, but at least it was an expected hazard in their line or work. Magical mind possession? That was new, even to a couple of battle-tested, seen-it-all, emotionally-guarded super-assassins.

Clint was trapped in his mind, forced to watch as his physical shell did whatever the hell Loki wanted it to, and it was then that he finally acknowledged how he really felt about Natasha. Because, really, what's the point of lying to yourself when a mythical god from another planet traps you inside your head and makes your body attack your partner. It's one thing to avoid admitting you love a woman because you don't want to lose your best friend. It's acceptable to choose not to follow the scorching hot path of desire (again, that is, and as frequently as possible) because you just know it will wreck the best partnership you've ever had. Yes, when you're in control of yourself and your surroundings, you can allow yourself to ignore what you're really feeling, what you really want, what you really desire. But that just doesn't work when you have control over nothing. Because then the only thing you can control is what you feel.

As Clint watched his body fight its way through the S.H.I.E.L.D. helicarrier, he finally acknowledged, if only to himself, that he was in love with Natasha Romanoff and had been for years, that he wanted more than just friendship, more than a professional partnership, a hell of a lot more than transitory sex. He wanted everything that Natasha was – the stolen childhood, the emotional walls, the brilliant mind, the passionate observer of the world, the fighter who could absolutely kick his ass – all of her. And he wanted her to have him in the same way. And if he ever got the chance, he was going to tell her the first chance he got.

Natasha Romanoff could confidently take on men twice her size. In fact, she would rather go against huge guys than those her own size – big men were used to getting by on physical intimidation, usually sacrificing skill in the process. Natasha was very good at exploiting that lack of skill to her advantage. Her ability to do this was not an accident or luck – the comely assassin had worked tirelessly most of her life to get to the point where her diminutive size was very rarely a hindrance when facing an opponent.

Most people familiar with Natasha's skill set assumed her high level of readiness was simply who she was, that it was part of who she had worked to become. Clint Barton knew differently. Part of the Russian conditioning program for Black Widow operatives required their constantly being pitted against opponents considerably bigger than themselves, starting when they were recruited, often as young as age four. Agents-in-training either got good enough to overcome sheer size or they died. Natasha became very, very good.

It didn't matter how good or skilled or fast an operative became, though – no one could beat The Hulk, and everyone knew it. While neither she nor Clint had ever fought the green monster face-to-face, Natasha didn't have to know that she didn't stand a chance against him. Facing The Hulk took her back to being the helpless little girl forced to defend herself against grown men who beat the crap out of her. The monster brought back all of her feelings of inadequacy and helplessness. And unlike that long ago time, there was nothing she could do to better prepare herself to face this threat. She truly was at his mercy.

As Natasha sat slumped on the floor against a bulkhead, she missed Clint Barton with all of her heart, and for once in her life she didn't try to kid herself about how she felt. She wanted Clint – she wanted him here sitting beside her with his arm around her shoulders, not saying a word but reassuring her simply through his presence that it would be all right, that she would get through this.

As she slouched, defeated, she could do nothing about the helplessness she felt in the face of The Hulk, so instead she grabbed on to the huge truth she had been avoiding for years. She loved Clint Barton and she wanted him in every way. And if she ever got the chance, she was going to tell him the first chance she got.

"It's Barton. He took out our systems. He's headed for the detention level!" Fury's voice came over her earpiece. "Does anybody copy?"

She was Natasha Romanoff, the Black Widow. She did not cower in corners. Her partner needed her.

"This is Agent Romanoff," Natasha says. "I copy."

As Clint Barton watched his body attack the woman he loved, he beat against the magical barrier that Loki had erected in his mind. From Clint's point of view, he beat at it physically, although that was really just the way his mind chose to deal with the unthinkable. Yes, in his mind, and in the nightmares that came later, Clint beat against a softly glowing blue wall that stood between his mind and his body. He battered it with his fists and his raised voice and all of his willpower. He shouted that he was sorry, that he loved her, that he didn't mean to do this. He hit the wall as hard as his body hit Tasha. He **willed** his body to stop. Not that any of it did any good. No, the wall stayed in place and his body's fists continued to go after his partner.

Natasha didn't have time to think about the horror of fighting Clint's body when his mind wasn't running it. She didn't have time to hate Loki for doing this to her partner. It took all of her concentration to battle Clint full-out without killing him. Avoiding deadly force was not usually part of Natasha Romanoff's fighting style.

"Tasha?"

Had the hit against the bar actually freed his mind? She had to make sure. Natasha dropped him.

The moment he was hit was the first moment the barrier wavered, and Clint clawed his way out of it just long enough to let Tasha know he was there. He had felt the wall slipping back up when she clocked him again, knocking him out. Now that he was awake again, Clint struggled to _stay_ out of the box. The world warped and wavered in front of him as he and blue wall fought to see which would win.

It was Natasha's presence that helped Clint destroy the psychic wall in his head, but he couldn't tell her he loved her until he knew that he wasn't going to slip away again, until he knew Loki's mental trap was permanently gone. He wished he could tell her, though. He wished it with the same strength of character he had used to fight to free himself from Loki's cage. And when he was ready, when he was certain that he was no longer a threat to her, he was going to tell Natasha how he felt about her. Of that he was certain.

As he woke up, Natasha worked to help Clint find his way back. She knew, though, better than anyone else, that accomplishing this would take more than a few minutes in the infirmary. She loved him, though, and she wasn't going to lie to herself about it anymore. She also wasn't going to rush Clint into that knowledge. When he was ready for it – when it might actually help him – she would tell him. She promised both herself and the man she loved, even if she didn't tell him aloud, that she would do whatever it took to help him heal. Of that she had no doubt.

To be continued...

**I hope you enjoyed this and I hope you want to read more. I'd love to hear your thoughts!**


	2. Giggles

**Internal Promises, Chapter 2**

**I've only seen one mention of the fact that Clint has a book on his lap in the shawarma restaurant. Considering the nature of fandom, I thought that was odd, so I included it here. Also, in most of the interactions I've seen between Scarlett Johansson and Jeremy Renner, they bring out each other's funny side – that provided the inspiration for the latter part of this chapter. Also, while the last chapter set this one up, I have to say that I like this one better. Yay!**

Clint was pretty sure he'd never been this tired in his entire life, and that was saying something. He did manage to raise his leg onto Natasha's chair, of which he was vaguely proud. He figured out how truly down-and-dirty tired he was when he found himself reading the shawarma menu, completely ignoring his surroundings in the process. As a kid, when he wanted to avoid the world around him, he would retreat into books, magazines, newspapers, cereal boxes – anything that took his focus off of what was going on around him. He hadn't done it in years, though, not since he chose his current career path. Given, it wasn't like he or Tasha was in a lot of danger when Iron Man, Thor, Captain America and The Hulk's alter ego were sitting at the same table, but still.

Dude was tired.

**THE AVENGERS**

As the Avengers gathered to see Thor and Loki off, Clint was filled with conflicting emotions. On the one hand, he had read years ago that one of the Asgardian forms of punishment involved dripping snake venom into a criminal's eye for eternity. So yes, he was quite pleased that Thor was claiming jurisdiction. Unfortunately as he was more rested now, the anger and confusion over what Loki had done to his mind were also better able to come to the surface.

Natasha sensed the difficulty that Clint was having and as Thor stepped away with Loki, she leaned up to the archer's ear and whispered, "Quick – shove an arrow up his ass."

Clint couldn't help but smile. He knew there was a reason he loved this woman.

The two of them watched the rest of the Avengers disperse in Thor's wake. The evening before they had returned to Stark Tower along with Tony and the rest of their new team for hot showers and some sleep. Clint and Natasha had wordlessly accepted separate sleeping quarters before spending the night in the same bed doing nothing but sleep. Now without a word to each other, they got in the car that Tony had provided and drove off, both knowing that they would head to a cabin that Natasha kept off the grid about two hours away. They could stop at a strip mall on the way to get supplies. The things they couldn't replace easily, that being their weapons, were already in the trunk.

They had been on the road for about half an hour when Clint started to laugh. Natasha looked over at him, curious. Neither of them had said anything since they got in the car, so his sudden mirth seemed to come out of nowhere.

"Clint? Want to share with the class?"

This just made him laugh harder. Natasha wasn't sure whether to be alarmed or to start laughing with him.

"Um, Clint, seriously? Are you okay?"

"We just – We just – We just – "

Her best friend was clearly trying to say something, but he couldn't get it out through his laughter.

As his eyes squeezed shut and actual tears started to leak out of the corners of his eyes, Natasha sat helpless as her best friend pulled the car over onto the shoulder of the highway. As cars zoomed by, he opened the door and practically crawled onto the shoulder, doubled over in seeming hysterics. Chuckling in confusion more than anything else, Natasha got out of her door and went around to pull Clint around to the side of the car on which there were no speeding cars.

"We just – We just – " Clint was still trying to communicate as he leaned against the passenger door with his hands on his knees.

"Clint, take a breath! What is it?"

Laughter answered.

"It's been a rough week – I could use a good joke!"

Clint struggled for breath and looked up.

"We just – We just – "

"This again?"

"We just fought flying alien worm lizards from outer space with the help of a GOD!"

That was all it took. Natasha lost it right along with Clint.

The two of them slid down the side of the car, the sound of passing cars providing the background soundtrack.

A few minutes later, Clint's laughter began to subside and he feebly batted his hand on Natasha's shoulder.

"What?" she managed to breathe out.

"I was going to say 'oh, my God', but then I realized I should say 'oh, my Thor'."

They looked each other in the eye and Natasha burst out, "OMT! OMT!"

The highly trained, lethal assassins collapsed into what some might term another fit of raucous giggles.

Some time later, the two of them began to regain some semblance of control.

Still laughing as he did so, Clint turned his head to look at Natasha and said, "Wow, I love you."

Natasha took a deep shuddering breath and said, "Oh, thank Thor."

Clint snort-laughed. "What?"

"Thank Thor you love me, because I love you, and if you didn't love me back, it was gonna really suck."

"Like that was gonna happen."

Natasha put her head on Clint's shoulder and he leaned his head over to rest on hers.

Clint reached his hand across his body and ran it through the redhead's hair.

"So, you ready for some time off or what?"

"Thor, yes," she answered with a smile.

To be continued...

**My family and I recently starting saying, "Oh, my Thor" and "OMT". I knew we couldn't be the only ones! :D **


	3. Confessions

**A/N: I don't write lemons, but there is some frank talk about sex in this chapter (not explicit, just very honest and open thoughts about it.) Trigger warning: infertility. Thank you so much to everyone who has favorited, followed and reviewed. It's been a blast writing this – I hope you enjoy!**

They arrived at the cabin and immediately set about putting the small dwelling in working order. Inside the rustic yet air conditioned home, they put away the groceries they had picked up, dusted the furniture and changed the linens, sharing the duties equally. Outside, they checked the defenses, set up the archery range and the obstacle course (which they both had fun with) and generally made sure the place was again in working order. Then Natasha left Clint to his target practice while she went inside for a quick shower.

As she opened her new personal products, Natasha thought back over the drive up. They had laughed with each other the rest of the drive after their unexpected stop on the shoulder of the highway. During that time, Natasha never let on her undercurrent of concern. Recovering from intense mind manipulation was complex and difficult. Their side-of-the-road giggle fit had provided a welcome and necessary release of tension. For every action, though, there was an equal and opposite reaction, and Natasha knew from experience that the emotional opposite of Clint's recovery would be as proportionately low as the high had been high. The question was what form it would take. Natasha wasn't looking forward to the man she loved going through that.

Feeling clean and refreshed, Natasha fluffed her hair as she walked outside to see how Clint was doing. As it turned out, her musings had been prescient. Things were not good.

At first glance, nothing was amiss. Clint was shooting arrows at a target ridiculously far away – standard for him. Only someone who knew him as well as Natasha did – which meant that ONLY Natasha – would be able to see that something was wrong. She could see that he was firing his arrows in what was almost a frenzy, one immediately after another with a fierceness that wasn't in any way routine. It was...animalistic, raw, desperate.

She crossed slowly to where he was, giving him time to register her presence, thinking about how she could address the situation before her. As she got closer, she could see the sheen of sweat covering him, even though the day was mild.

"I can't think about it," he ground out through clenched teeth, not stopping in his obsessive shooting for an instant. In the distance, she could see that the target already had what looked like dozens of arrows clustered in the middle. "If I stop, that's all I'll think about – the men I killed, being trapped, hurting you."

_Grab, shoot, grab, shoot. _

"I can't. I just can't."

She slowly moved into his personal space, causing his rhythm to falter for the first time. She took that as her opening, reaching her arms around him and placing her head on his chest. His arms fell exhausted against her sides, and she had to wonder how long he had been shooting like that.

"I can't do this, Tasha. I can't live like this. What do I do?"

Natasha tightened her grip on him. "We take it one day at a time, Clint. You get up every day and you keep going. And I'll be there with you."

Clint didn't respond, he just tightened his own arms around her.

**THE AVENGERS**

Natasha Romanoff had never made love. She'd had sex, to be sure, most often in a professional capacity. Twice she had slept with men in non-professional situations to prove a point to herself, but that was as close as she had come to engaging in sexual relations for purposes of a, pleasure, or b, expressing love. As a result, the great and terrible Black Widow was actually a little nervous about the prospect of making love with Clint Barton.

One of her non-professional encounters was with a fellow Russian operative-in-training who had a huge crush on her and to whom she had been attracted in return. Young Comrade Romanoff had desired to prove to herself that she could distance herself from her emotions, so she slept with Natoly, dumped him, then worked to make sure that she didn't have an emotional reaction to his devastation or to her own actions. The other encounter was with Clint.

This time with Clint, though, she didn't want it to be a one-time thing. She wasn't trying to convince herself that her feelings were really just hormones. She didn't want to get it over with so they could concentrate on being partners. She also didn't want hearts and flowers or a white picket fence, children weren't even a possibility. She and Clint both knew, Clint because she had told him, that Natasha couldn't have children – the Russians had seen to that. She also knew that Clint was more than okay with this because he had long ago told her that the very worst thing agents of their caliber could do was to bring children into the world, as he felt that they would then exist solely to be used as pawns against their parents.

What Natasha did want...well, that was a good question. And she figured she and Clint were going to have to talk about it. But later. When he wasn't busy hating himself for what Loki had done to him.

Clint, on the other hand, was afraid that the blue wall was going to shoot up as he slept and he would come out of it to find himself hurting Natasha. Again. More than any other image, scenes from his fight with Tasha on the helicarrier were what kept going through his mind. He had a thorough understanding of every thought that went through what passed for his body's mind during his imprisonment, and he knew for a fact that if he had been able to, he would have killed his partner. The fear of repeating the event was working really hard to overshadow his excitement at the prospect of finally making love to Natasha, and that just pissed him off on top of everything else.

Natasha was the one who finally broke the tension by talking about it. She spoke up as they ate dinner at the small table in the kitchen that evening.

"Do we really have to be this tense about it?"

Clint looked up at her.

"It's not even the first time."

Clint gave her a look. She hadn't been the only one proving a point their first go-around.

"Okay, it's very different circumstances. We don't want it to happen once, you're recovering from mind control, we just fought flying alien worm lizards –"

"With the help of a god," he cut her off and they both smiled.

"I love you, you love me –"

He cut her off again, this time breaking into song. "We're a happy family, with a great big hug –" He stopped when he saw the completely lost expression on her face.

"Not a lot of Barney in Siberia. Right."

"Barney?"

"Story for another time. There's been enough death and destruction for now."

"Right. Getting back on track, then."

Clint managed to look sheepish.

"What are you most worried about?"

The question surprised him and caused him to answer bluntly.

"Killing you in my sleep."

She pondered this.

"Did you sleep when you were with Loki?"

He thought for a moment. "I don't think so...I hadn't thought about it, but... No...I don't think I did."

"You said last night it was like a blue wall caging you off from your body, right?" He nodded and she continued. "Maybe if Loki didn't have control of your conscious mind, the wall would have come down. Things like that aren't uncommon when it comes to mind control – they're the weakest when the brain is at rest. So it may be that you're actually safest when you're asleep."

"It's still a maybe."

"And so is the fact that we'll both be alive in a week given the lives that we lead. If nothing else, be glad that it's me here because I'm better equipped than just about any other women you know to handle it if something were to happen, no matter when it was."

That he couldn't argue with. So now it was his turn.

"What are you most worried about?"

She sighed. "The obvious. This is the best partnership I've ever had and you're the most important person in my life. If we try this and it blows up in our faces, I don't think I would survive losing my partner and best friend. I mean, come on, I've never been in a relationship. What if I screw it up six ways to Sunday? I just – I can't lose you."

Clint looked at Natasha for a moment, then put down his fork and walked around to her, pulling her up to stand in front of him. He put his hands on either side of her face and pressed his lips against hers. What started out gentle quickly turned fierce as the two of them found themselves instinctively letting loose with years of pent-up sexual frustration and emotion.

When they finally pulled away from each in order to breathe, Clint rested his forehead against hers and closed his eyes, his hands now wrapped through her hair, his thumbs massaging her temples.

"I will always be there for you. I will always have your back. I will always be faithful to you and you will never have to wonder if you can trust me." He leaned back and she looked up at him, allowing genuine emotion to shine openly to a man for the first time in her adult life.

"I have no idea what is going to happen when we leave here," he continued. "Are we going to work more with The Avengers, or will we spend more time with S.H.I.E.L.D.? Will we do both? Where will we live? How long will it take Tony to figure out that we're in a relationship and how embarrassed is Steve going to be when he figures it out?" She smiled at him in agreement to all of this. "I don't have the answers to those things, Tasha, and I am so afraid that I will end up back in that box Loki put me in." She opened her mouth, but he kept going.

"But you know what? It took an alien invasion to get us to admit how we feel about each other. Let's not waste it."

This time it was Natasha that initiated the kiss. And this time they didn't come up for air.

In the wee hours of the morning, in that moment between sleep and wakefulness when the mind is most unguarded, Natasha realized why the people who trained her all those years ago had worked so hard to make their agents believe that love was to be avoided. It was because it was actually the strongest, most powerful force in the universe and against it the state – and anyone else – would always be powerless. And now that she knew that, she could never look at the world in the same way again.

She pulled Clint tighter and slept.

/fin

**As a note, I don't think one night is going to transport them to instant and permanent bliss, but I do believe that this pair would and will work together to approach their problems together. I'd love to hear your response. I hope you enjoyed this and have a great week!**


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